NGC Sponsors New Labs at Baltimore Leadership School for Young Women
Two new science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) laboratories have been opened at the Baltimore Leadership School for Young Women (BLSYW), thanks to a grant and in-kind support from Northrop Grumman Corp. (NGC).
BLSYW is a public charter school on W. Franklin Street in downtown Baltimore, publicly funded and open to all students with no admission testing or screening. The school is operated in partnership with the foundation for BLSYW, which has developed relationships with organizations and companies such as NGC to establish new programs, create new educational opportunities and provide additional funding and human resources to build, operate and sustain BLSYW programs.
Pictured, from left, are Danita Mitchell and Ted Imes of NGC. They presented a symbolic check for $67,000 to BLSYW Founder Brenda Brown Rever and Principal Lorna Hanley.
APL Celebrates 70 Years of Critical Contributions
The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) has marked its 70th year of operation. APL, a nonprofit research division of The Johns Hopkins University, develops solutions for government sponsors in traditional areas such as air defense, undersea warfare, precision engagement, strategic systems and space systems, and in more recent disciplines, like homeland protection and cyber operations.
APL is known for its systems engineering, and in its early years applied the discipline to advance anti-aircraft weaponry, missile accuracy, satellite navigation and sensor networks. As the world and technology became more complex, the lab took on increasingly difficult programs that included advanced sensors, data fusion, autonomous operations, networking and applied neuroscience.
It also is one of only four “end-to-end” space research facilities in the U.S. that can design and build a spacecraft plus manage the mission. APL has built 64 spacecraft and nearly 200 space instruments for NASA and defense sponsors. Today, one of its spacecraft is in orbit around Mercury (Messenger), and another is headed to Pluto (New Horizons).
TEDCO, Abell Foundation Announce New Propel Baltimore Fund
The Columbia-based Maryland Technology Development Corp. (TEDCO), in collaboration with The Abell Foundation, has established the $3.3 million Propel Baltimore Fund, an angel investment fund for entrepreneurs and startup companies in Baltimore City.
TEDCO will administer the fund, through which companies may receive maximum investments of up to $220,000. It will be available to companies with new technology ideas or innovation-focused business plans that are currently based in (or are willing to relocate to) the city. The fund will lead investments into these companies and will require a 50% match from other investors to go along with the Propel Baltimore Fund capital.
The initial investment into each company will be $50,000 to $100,000, with a maximum total investment of $220,000. The Propel Baltimore Fund is seeking companies that can provide returns to investors in five to seven years.
Howard County Taking Action on Health Disparities
Howard County Health Officer Dr. Peter Beilenson and more than 50 members of Howard County’s Local Health Improvement Coalition recently released the 2012–2014 Local Health Improvement Action Plan.
Developed as part of the county’s participation in the State Health Improvement Process, the plan prioritizes three categories of local health need: increasing access to affordable care, obesity prevention for children and adults and improving behavioral health outcomes.
The plan provides a framework to guide local action to reduce health disparities and inequities and improve local health outcomes for all. “Creating this action plan has truly been a collaborative effort across all segments of the Howard County community,” said Beilenson. “Implementing the 2012–14 plan is sure to significantly improve the health of all county residents and, importantly, reduce critical disparities that exist.”
Target First to Open at Village South at Waugh Chapel
The new Target store at Village South at Waugh Chapel in Gambrills has opened its doors, marking the first of several planned spring openings for retailers and restaurants at the new $275 million, 1.2 million-square-foot, open-air mixed-use project.
A 50,000-square-foot Dick’s Sporting Goods, PETCO, Panera Bread and Old Navy are also preparing to open this spring. Wegmans is slated to open in October. Cited as the largest retail project currently under construction in the country by Shopping Centers Today magazine, Village South at Waugh Chapel will feature nearly 650,000 square feet of retail space, with 130,000 square feet of Class A office space.
Additionally, Bozzuto Group is building a 298-unit apartment complex, The Beacon at Waugh Chapel, which will encompass 365,000 square feet. The $57 million, four-story building is slated to open in 2013.
TCS Selected by DCI for Satellite Services, Garners $25M in Funding
TeleCommunication Systems (TCS) announced that Diversified Communications Inc. (DCI), a provider of teleport and transportable satellite services, has selected TCS to provide mixed C- and Ku-band access to its TCS OS-IRIS offering. TCS OS-IRIS (Internet Routing in Space) is the world’s first commercial service offering of a Cisco-enabled IRIS managed satellite service.
DCI provides teleport and transportable satellite services for global, commercial and government clients for “live coverage” of news, sports and entertainment events. “This arrangement will enable us to dynamically move between news events and allocate satellite bandwidth ‘on the fly’ to each event without the intervention of a satellite operator,” said DCI Director of Engineering Joe Concaugh.
Annapolis-based TCS also has been awarded $25 million in incremental funding to provide the U.S. Marine Corps with field support services for its communications infrastructure.
KEYW, Sensage Create Mission-Grade Cyber Intelligence Service
Hanover-based KEYW and Sensage have announced a strategic technology alliance to deliver “mission-grade” cyberintelligence services to commercial enterprises and government agencies intent on understanding and minimizing cyber-risks. At the core of this service are cyberanalytics derived from the fusion of operational, security and behavioral information about the cyber domain.
The new alliance will combine the extensive cyberanalytics and security operations expertise of KEYW with the advanced event data warehousing and security intelligence solutions offered by Sensage. KEYW’s new Cyber Intelligence Service will offer a platform of tools, capabilities and offerings developed for the national defense and intelligence community to deliver cyber awareness and operational surety.
Constellation, Exelon Complete Merger
Exelon Corp. and Constellation Energy have completed their merger, with Christopher Crane to serve as president and CEO of the combined company, and Mayo Shattuck named as executive chairman. The new company retains the Exelon name and remains headquartered in Chicago, with operations in Maryland, Illinois and Pennsylvania.
The merged company is now one of the nation’s largest energy products and services suppliers by load, with approximately 164 terawatt-hours per year; and with approximately 100,000 business and public sector and approximately 1 million residential customers, serving more than two-thirds of America’s Fortune 100 companies. The three utilities within Exelon — BGE, ComEd and PECO — will remain headquartered in Baltimore, Chicago and Philadelphia, respectively.
Capitol College to Offer Reduced Summer Tuition Rates
Capitol College will offer summer undergraduate courses at a reduced rate for the fifth consecutive year. All undergraduate classes at the Laurel campus will be discounted by 33% of their normal rate for the summer 2012 semester.
For the engineering, computer science and technology undergraduate degree programs, on-campus and online classes will be offered at $456 per credit. Capitol’s business and management degree programs will offer on-campus and online classes for $236 per credit. Students can register for summer undergraduate programs until May 18. In addition to reduced tuition, Capitol offers financial aid to more than 80% of its student body through scholarships, grants, loans and work-study programs.
Select Eye Care Building Surgery Facility at Howard Wellness Center
Select Eye Care will move its Columbia office to the new Howard Wellness Center at Routes 100 and 103 in Elkridge this fall. Select is building a 10,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art surgery center to accommodate its new LenSx laser system, which performs precision bladeless cataract surgery that is based on the same femtosecond technology used during bladeless LASIK procedures.
The Howard Wellness Center, when completed, will encompass 40,000 square feet and include a variety of medical-related practices. The building will be LEED certified.
Arundel’s Leopold Announces Airing of New Cable Program ‘The Department’
Anne Arundel County Executive John Leopold has announced the premiere of a new cable television show, “The Department,” that will take viewers in the field with inspectors, animal control officers and more.
The show will air daily on Anne Arundel Community Television at 11 a.m. and 8 p.m. The first episode features zoning and critical area inspectors from the Department of Inspections & Permits. Comcast viewers can view Community Television on Channel 98. Verizon broadcasts the programming on Channel 38.
BWI Marshall Hosting RFK Center’s ‘Speak Truth To Power’ Exhibit
The Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights is displaying its celebrated “Speak Truth To Power” photography exhibition at BWI Thurgood Marshall Airport. The exhibition will be presented in BWI Marshall’s International Terminal through May 31.
The collection features moving and powerful photographs by the late Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist Eddie Adams. The images document courage by featuring human rights defenders around the globe; the exhibition examines human rights by highlighting issues such as nuclear disarmament, children in war, environmental activism and religious self-determination. The RFK Center’s “Speak Truth To Power” exhibition has traveled to more than 20 cities around the world since its initial launch at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.
Comcast Launches Chamber Referral Program
Comcast Corp. has announced the regional rollout of its Chamber Referral Program in Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, D.C., as part of an ongoing strategy to help small businesses access advanced communications solutions. This program offers local chambers of commerce additional opportunities to extend discounts to their members on select tiers of Comcast Business Class Internet and Comcast Business Class Voice products.
Through the program, customers who sign up through their chamber of commerce can now receive a 16% discount on Comcast’s Business Class Premium service and get speeds of up to 22 Mbps download/5 Mbps upload for $85 per month. Alternatively, they can choose Comcast’s Business Class Deluxe Internet service, which provides speeds of up to 100 Mbps download/10 Mbps upload for $160 per month, which is a discount of 15% off regular pricing.
Robinson Nature Center Earns LEED Platinum Designation
The Robinson Nature Center has been recognized by the U.S. Green Building Council for achieving Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Platinum certification. LEED provides building owners and operators with a framework for identifying and implementing practical and measurable green building design, construction, operations and maintenance solutions.
The center is one of only three publically-owned and -operated buildings in the state of Maryland to earn LEED Platinum, the highest level of certification awarded. Among the green elements included at the Robinson Nature Center are solar panels to offset the building’s energy costs; pervious paving, which helps recharge groundwater and reduces runoff that carries contaminants into waterways; a green roof, which helps the building keep cool; and a geothermal HVAC, which is projected to cut heating and cooling energy use by 30% over a conventional air source heat pump system.
Local Author’s Latest Book Makes Kirkus Reviews’ ‘Best of 2011’
Kirkus Reviews, a well-known book review magazine, has named Ellicott City-based author Sherban Young’s latest mystery caper, Fleeting Memory, to its “Best of 2011” list in the Quick-Witted, Indie category.
The editors at Kirkus make their “Best of” selections by “singl[ing] out the books we loved reading most, the ones we would recommend to friends.” Based on their review of Young’s book, and its appearance on their “Best of 2011” list, the editors highly recommend this book. What Kirkus had to say about the book included: “An utterly winning, deceptively smart collection of mishaps, plot twists and grinning one-liners.”
AACC’S Health IT Program Accredited
The Commission on Accreditation for Health Informatics and Information Management Education has accredited Anne Arundel Community College’s (AACC) Health Information Technology Associate of Applied Science degree program.
The accreditation allows AACC students who complete the program to take the national registered health information technology exam to become a certified Registered Health Information Technician, including recent graduates of the 63-credit-hour program. The college recognized the program’s first graduates in May 2011.
Jefferson & Associates Launches the CJA Back Office
Cheryl Jefferson Cooke, CPA, of Cheryl Jefferson & Associates, has launched The CJA Back Office. The partner firm provides cost-effective, full back office accounting and finance support to small and mid-sized businesses that do not require an independent CPA firm, audit or review in conjunction with those services.
Services include monthly bookkeeping, outsourced accounting, training and staff augmentation. In addition, financial management and analysis type services will also be offered. In keeping in line with the firm’s core clientele, the CJA Back Office will focus on service industries, professionals, consultants and government contractors.
KBE, Balfour Beatty Begin Construction on FAA Project
KBE Building Corp. and Balfour Beatty Construction have begun work together on the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA’s) Control Wing Basement Modernization and Major Mechanical Design/Build initiative.
The $12 million design/build project is taking place at the Long Island McArthur Airport in Ronkonkoma, N.Y. KBE is working with Balfour Beatty through a consulting agreement. The project consists of major mechanical and electrical renovations and replacements within the mission-critical data center facilities. Completion is slated for September 2013.
Wynn Las Vegas, Encore Casino Resorts Tabs Micros
Columbia-based Micros Systems, a leading provider of information technology solutions for the hospitality and retail industries, has announced that Wynn Resorts has selected Micros’s Simphony Enterprise Solution for its Wynn Las Vegas and Encore casino resort properties.
Micros recently completed its enterprise-wide conversion upgrade from the Micros 9700 Hospitality Management System and other Legacy POS solutions to the Micros Simphony Software as a Service enterprise solution in the cloud. The project encompasses more than 100 Revenue Centers located across the two casino resort properties and includes more than 500 MICROS Workstation 5A point-of-service terminals.
Lakeview Title Renews YPN Sponsorship
The Young Professionals Network of Howard County (YPN), a program of the Howard County Chamber of Commerce, renewed its annual sponsorship agreement with Columbia-based Lakeview Title Co. Highlights of the deal include a company listing and logo on all of YPN’s printed and online marketing materials, complimentary admission for four to bi-monthly mixers, and the opportunity to display signs and distribute materials to an average of 100 community members at these events.
Annual sponsors also receive benefits from the chamber, including complimentary admission to select events and a 10% discount on advertising on www.howardchamber.com. YPN is sponsored annually by Lakeview, the Columbia Association, the David Yungmann Realty Group, Loyola University-Maryland’s Sellinger School of Business and The Business Monthly.
Edible Arrangements Updates Partnership to Include All HCPSS Schools
Edible Arrangements, of Columbia, Ellicott City and Laurel, has expanded its existing partnership to include all Howard County public elementary, middle and high schools.
Under the terms of the updated agreement, Edible Arrangements will make 4,400 gift certificates with a retail value of $83,000 available to principals at all Howard County public schools for monthly recognition of students who meet academic/behavioral goals. The rewards will support the schools’ Student of the Month and Positive Behavior Intervention System (PBIS) programs. PBIS is a research-based discipline system which uses incentives and rewards to motivate students to make healthy, positive choices.
Sandy Spring Again Named to Forbes List
Sandy Spring Bancorp, of Olney, again ranked among the top Most Trustworthy Companies list compiled for Forbes by GovernanceMetrics International (GMI), a New York-based independent global leader in corporate governance.
GMI takes both a quantitative and qualitative analysis beyond the raw data of a company’s income statement and balance sheet to assess the true quality of corporate accounting and management practices. GMI asserts its 100 Most Trustworthy Companies have consistently demonstrated transparent and conservative accounting practices, as well as solid corporate governance and management. To develop the list, GMI examined data from more than 8,000 companies trading on U.S. exchanges.
Applications Being Accepted for NGC Engineering Scholars Program
Applications are now being accepted for the 10th annual Northrop Grumman Corp. (NGC) Engineering Scholars competition, which will provide a total of $240,000 in college scholarships across Maryland this year to promising high school seniors interested in studying engineering.
Individual scholarships of $10,000 payable in $2,500 installments over four years will be awarded by NGC this spring to a qualified graduating high school senior in each of Maryland’s 23 counties and Baltimore City. Candidates must plan to attend an accredited college or university school of engineering as a full-time student in an approved engineering program. The funds may be used for tuition, books, room and board and lab fees. The application is available at www.es.northropgrumman.com/engscholars.
Survey Ranks Old Line Among Nation’s Top 100 Community Banks
Bowie-based Old Line Bank has been ranked 46th among the nation’s 100 top-performing community banks with total assets between $500 million and $5 billion, according to an annual survey by SNL Financial.
The metrics used were: return on average tangible assets before tax, net charge-offs as a percentage of average loans, adjusted Texas ratio, efficiency ratio, net interest margin and loan growth. Old Line, with total assets at Dec. 31, 2011, of approximately $811 million, was one of only two Maryland banks to make the top 100; no banks in the comparable asset size range headquartered in Delaware, Washington, D.C., or Virginia made the list.
Columbia Business Honored With Ruby Award
Columbia-based Applied Performance Strategies (APS) has been honored as an Inscape Publishing Ruby Award Winner. In 2011, fewer than 2% of Inscape distributors earned the honor of such acknowledgement.
APS is a veteran-owned business that assists employers nationwide in developing skilled workforces in the areas of leadership and interpersonal skills, and assists manufacturers in improving operations and maintenance productivity, as well as implementing new technologies on the factory floor.
Correction: In last month’s issue, we incorrectly identified Leadership Howard County’s Cook-Off winning team. The team pictured won the dessert portion, but the overall winning team and current holder of the “Hunt” Trophy is the Class of 2011 team. It was led by Nicole Kelly, Lara Klick, Marc Kolp and Scot Millen. See the article in this month’s Salute to Leadership Howard County for more details and the photo.
